One of the Rotten Ones
by imlaughingnow
Summary: Jade saw it; the way Tori played with her food, the way Cat started coming to school in yesterday's clothes, the way Robbie used Rex to break dreams. She saw Andre & Beck outside his RV, snorting up. Just like how they all saw her wrists. Bade, Cabbie


**Disclaimer**: I own nothing except Justin. Lameee

Listen to _Anthems of a Seventeen Year Old Girl by broken social scene_ if you're one of those who like a little background music.

**(.x.)**

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><p><strong>The Rotten Ones<strong>

Hollywood was a fucked up place. It wasn't all smiles and success. Sometimes it was blood, days of hunger and meaningless sex. No one should sugar coat it. Half of the people that went to Hollywood never returned. They were wondering around, soulless; empty, starving for their five minutes. People in Hollywood did stupid things. They starved themselves, they cut themselves, they took drugs, they cheated others, they lied, they dug their heels so deep into your back that there would be no way you'd be able to get back up and dust yourself off. Some people just got lost. So very lost in everything; in their need to be recognized as the exceptional person they believed themselves to be.

Jade saw it. She saw the way Tori played with her food, the way Cat had started coming to school in yesterday's clothes, she saw the way Robbie used Rex to break down dreams, insult by insult. She also saw Andre and Beck outside his RV, snorting up something she knew wasn't salt or baby powder. Just liked how they saw her long sleeves and clunky bangles. Jade saw her mother, collapsed on the kitchen floor with a bottle of vodka rolling around, spilling its contents like a halo around her mother's body. A constant reminder that it was there and always would be. Vodka was her mother's new husband and money was her new stepmother.

At school, no one mentioned it. They were actors. So they acted; they faked smiles and tried to be as normal as they could but Tori would never take a bite of that burrito and Cat would never feel loved enough. Andre and Beck would always be in debt for buying so much crack and Jade's mother would always be a helpless drunk.

Black clothes and deep scars was not how she intended to be remembered. She wanted to be shining under stage lights, cheeks hurting from smiling too widely and hands full of roses. She wanted to have a future. She wanted to be successful. She wanted to be _happy_. Happy like everyone else in the world seemed to be. Not consumed with anger and pain like everyone around her seemed to be.

Cat's incessant rambling never made her happy anymore. Beck didn't make her happy anymore. And if Beck couldn't then she would find a way to be happy herself. She never broke up with him. She didn't have the heart. Instead she sat in front of class, avoiding his bloodshot eyes.

_Jade wore less makeup. _

Tori lost twenty-five pounds and made snarky comments about Jade's sudden distance. She was always tired, putting her head on the table and falling asleep within minutes. Her eyes were sunken in and she had large, black circles under them. Her clothes never seemed to fit but her hair was always in place. Her cheekbones stuck out the most and no one commented on how exquisite they were anymore. She hardly spoke and when she did she was bitter, cold and lashed out at anyone who was near. Tori just wanted to be noticed, to be pretty, to be perfect but it turned out to be harder than she thought. She cut out models from Vogue and stuck them on her wall. She wanted to look like them, to be as skinny as they were. She wanted to be a size zero.

She was a size zero now, but it wasn't enough. So she diced her food into tiny pieces and pushed them around her plate. If she did eat, she made sure to purge herself of the calories before she went to sleep. She never did her homework anymore, she was too tired. Tori forgot her lines and was too tired to make it through each rehearsal so she was kicked out and Jade, her understudy took her place. Jade took it all. Jade, her eyes flashed dangerously, was never tired. She hated Jade; perfect Jade who could walk away from it all. Jade, who had enough strength to stop. She would never be enough.

_Jade started doing her homework. _

When Cat spent those rare moments alone, she listened to her parents coo over her brother. He was _special,_ they said. He was more important than her school plays and talent shows. He was more important than her shallow need for a new dress. She would think about her first boyfriend too; the one who loved her, who made her feel special. The one who she wanted to make feel special but when Cat was re-dressing he had disappeared with her most prized possession. He wasn't the same; he had disappeared inside himself, becoming someone she couldn't recognize. She tried to win him over, she really did but he had slammed her into the lockers and sprained her wrist for the last time. The words "slut" and "whore" were on everyone's lips the next day. She grinned through it and twirled her hair around her finger but she never stopped searching. She never stopped hurting.

Cat had a new guy on her hand every week. She giggled and smiled coyly to get what she wanted. Sometimes she didn't get it but she would never stop searching for it; that little piece of herself that she gave away. She would go through all the boys in Hollywood if she had to, but she wanted it back. She needed it back. No one ever told her that love and sex was a no take-back. You can take, take, take but you can never receive; you can never get it back. So Cat took from everyone else to replace what she had lost, but it was never enough. It would never be enough.

_Jade called her dad on the weekends._

Robbie spat fire from his lips. He didn't need Rex to remind him of how much of a loser he was. He could do that all on his own with the help of every student at Hollywood Arts. Robbie cut his hair and finally found himself a girlfriend. Robbie liked bossing her around, he liked it when she cried; he liked power. Craved it. She wanted love. He couldn't give her that, but he never let her go. When Robbie was angry, she felt it when he lashed out, physically and emotionally.

Robbie bought contacts and started working out in the gym; he ditched Rex and saved up enough money to buy a car. His father was proud of the man he was becoming. His mother watched him with sad eyes but never commented on the change. Robbie yelled at his girlfriend like he saw his father did to his mother and soon enough, he started hitting her like his father did with his mother too. _It's what real men do_, his father told him when he was a young boy. His father was no longer proud, not when his mother had filed for divorce. Instead his father was angry, Robbie was_ a failure and he sure as hell could never make it in Hollywood. People would pay more to see his stupid puppet than they would to see him_.

She was considering leaving him. She said he wasn't the same. So he bought a hammer and made sure to crush her heart into little pieces, cackling as she scrambled to put them together and make herself whole again but she never would because inside his pocket was the last piece. She would never be complete unless she had all the pieces. _He wasn't good enough for her_, she had shouted at him; he would never be good enough.

_Jade stopped dyeing her hair._

Andre needed money. He had gambled all his savings away and was considering getting a job when one of his cousins let him in on one of the biggest business deal of the century. Drugs. Andre could sell them, transport them or even hold them for a few days and get a cut. _He wasn't using them right? _But it wasn't enough, so Andre made a name for himself in the business. He wouldn't use them. He would never use them. Until his grandmother died and the only company he had were the large, thick bags under his bed.

_He wasn't going get addicted. It was just one time. _He called up Beck because Beck would stop him from doing anything stupid. They did everything together. They even had their first kiss with the same girl; Jade. Everything was competition; basketball, music, detention slips. And soon enough, drugs was a competition too. Who could get high first but now it was who could use the most and get high last. Jade used to be a competition too but Andre had lost. He would never be good enough.

_Jade started wearing less black. _

Beck felt it. He felt Jade's hand slip out of his. He could see them, pale and soft, reaching for him, searching for his own hands but he could never muster enough energy to chase after her figure. She was fading, his memories were blurring but still he fought, he called out to her but she never answered. She was too far away. _Where was she going?_ _She was always next to him, her body warmth somehow giving him strength_. He didn't need as much when she was around. Jade was his antidote. He needed her. He loved her.

"If she wants to leave, let her leave." He mumbled seeing her under her tree, her lunch next to her school bag, book in hand.

"I can help you forget her." Andre promised and Andre never broke his promises.

Beck was forgetting. He had moments of clarity when he saw things that couldn't possibly be real. Jade was where she had always been, in that same spot but he was the one that was moving backwards. She was calling out his name but Beck hid in the corner and tried to forget. One day Jade stopped calling and her hands fell to her sides. Jade was murmuring softly to him but he didn't understand her; he couldn't make out her words. He just knew that she was speaking and _fuck_, he loved her voice. Then she was gone. The only source of light in his world was shining at its brightest until she was gone. Beck found himself in darkness, he couldn't see without her. She was shining; hell it was the brightest he had ever seen her shine but she wasn't shining for him. All he did was blink and she disappeared.

He sat there, listening to the silence, a small buzzing echoing inside his head until he heard Andre's voice, "It'll make it better man. It always will."

So Beck found himself taking more and more of the white substance each time. He sold his guitar and had even borrowed money from his parents. It always took more each time but it would never be enough to forget her or to summon her. He would never be enough for Jade.

_Jade sat alone under a tree at lunch, away from everyone. _

Jade was alone when she saw it; an escape. It was small and she had to squint her eyes for while but she saw it. She picked up Robbie's hammer; the one he used to break Cat and she pounded it against the wall. She needed to make the hole bigger; she had to get them out of there. She had to get out of there. Yet no matter how hard or how long she tried, the hole was never changed in size. Beads of sweat were streaming down her face; she was _sweating_ for God's sake but it wasn't making a difference. She took off her black cardigan to cool down. If she could find the light, no matter how small, surely the others could find it too. The hole widened on itself and she saw a face peering down at her curiously.

"Hey, you look lonely." He said but his hands reached out of her to grab; he was going to pull her to safety. "I'm Justin and I'm new here." Justin retracted his hand awkwardly as Jade blinked in confusion. _If she didn't want to shake his hand, then she sure as hell didn't want to talk_, he thought. "Look, if you're busy…"

"Wait," she called out as he backed away and Justin watched as she squirmed in her seat. She held out her hands and spoke softly, "Help me back up." Justin nodded solemnly, knowing the words meant more than they should. He could hear it in her voice. Her lunch was ruined and her books scattered around her haphazardly. "I'm Jade."

Together they gathered her belongings and Jade let him carry her books to her locker. She could feel their gazes boring through the back of her skull but she ignored it. Justin _could_ help her. Justin _would_ help her. Justin never used drugs, hated the taste of alcohol and was still a virgin. He ate enough for five people and was terrified of sharp objects. Justin asked her about her scars and emptied her room of all the razors and her scissors collection. He helped her clean after her mom and urged her to call her dad. He even got Jade a job so she could save enough money to pay the bills. Justin helped her with her homework and helped her pack her things into boxes because _there were others who needed help_.

Justin helped Jade escape. He grabbed her by the hand and tugged her through the hole. She didn't know how, but he had made it much larger than it was before. It wasn't gigantic or anything but it was big enough for a clean getaway. Jade and Justin had widened the hole. It was the most she could do. She illuminated that dark place where they had all been hiding; it wasn't much but it was a start. With any luck, they would find the light too.

As much as she wanted to help them, she couldn't until they found the light; their own light.

Hollywood was a fucked up place but that didn't mean that everyone there had to be screwed up, did it? There were those shining stars that had somehow managed to look for something else; something different. They found the light; they became the light, the light that others would be drawn to. Just like Justin had been her light, Jade would be theirs.

The most she could do was shine her brightest. Make it shine until they realized it was enough. They were enough. They would always be enough.

**(.x.)**

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><p><strong>AN So, I'm a newcomer to Victorious and I haven't written anything for FFN in a while. Well, I haven't posted them. Hopefully that managed to evoke some emotion in someone. So to clarify this is kinda AU. Yeah, I know. Cabbie did exist and Robbie's the one that stole Cat's...ahem...flower. Most of this is a giant metaphor that I really hope people got. Otherwise, this would be confusing as chiz. I apologize for the crude language. I thought it felt necessary. I hope I managed to describe everything perfectly because...well I've never had any experience with any of those things. I wanted to do this because Hollywood isn't the place Victorious cakes it up to be. And I figure the one less likely to bend over and become a bum would be Jade because she's really determined and stubborn. Sorry for any mistakes out there. **

**With any luck, I'd be able to say this was successful. **

**Reviews anyone?**

**-S**


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